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Pad Girls! Attack of
the 21st-Century Falsies
Published in The New York Observer, December 18, 2007
To the long list of things making New York City more homogenous—funky
brownstones razed in preparation for high-rise condos, chain-store franchises
displacing neighborhood favorites—add women’s breasts.
Have you noticed? Increasingly, the ladies of this town have been sporting
remarkably similar pairs of perfect, pert globes: rounder, higher and
larger than ever before. There has been an absence of breast individuality
such as lace, seams, overflow, jiggle, signs of gravitational pull and,
most notably, nipple.
The flawless orbs that have been parading around the city are achieved
by strapping on a “lined,” “T-shirt,” or “contour”
bra. These are marketing terms for what is essentially a modern padded
bra. This is not the quilted number of years past, but rather a smooth,
immaculate device with foam-infused breast cups. Each cup is preformed,
creepily having the same shape on or off the body. These lined bras have
eased out simple cotton, silk or lace bras, and comprise about 90 to 95
percent of the bras for sale in Victoria’s Secret, the Gap, or any
of the mainstream department stores.
“I always try and push them, because it gives a better lift and
you don’t see the nipples peeking through,” said Heather,
a young lingerie saleswomen in mod makeup, a black mini-dress and furry
boots who was working at Saks Fifth Avenue’s lingerie department
the other day, holding a hanger with two silky but sturdy cups dangling
from straps. Her colleague, Carolina, concurred: “A lot of women
have problems with their”—and here her voice dropped to a
whisper—“nipples showing.”
Amid the endless racks of protruding breast cups and in the Victoria’s
Secret store on lower Fifth Avenue, saleswomen Chrystal Toppin explained:
“These bras hide the nipples. It is a trend. A lot of women don’t
want to protrude and attract the wrong kind of attention.”
For women who have never particularly noticed or cared if a little nipple
shows when a cool breeze passes, or haven’t wanted to mask their
natural shape, this trend has made bra-shopping a tedious, expensive affair.
And many men are baffled.“It’s absurd!” exclaimed Luca,
a handsome Italian mathematician who makes ample time for socializing.
“Women here have their breasts on a platter, but then no nipple.”
Luca theorized that women in New York City are caught in a negative-reinforcement
loop. “Manufactures see that a sizable population want this kind
of bra, so now there isn’t anything else to buy. Women have started
to believe shop assistants when they suggest hiding the nipple is good.”
Asset Management
It’s not just the camouflage of this crucial bit of tissue that
is confounding men, but the illusion of general greater endowment, perhaps
unseen since the falsies of the 1950’s, that these underpinnings
universally impart. “I’ve been disappointed when I’ve
taken one of those bras off,” said Christian, a 45-year-old artist-photographer
who declared himself “passionate” about the subject. He went
on: “I’ve had to try and hide my look of surprise. It’s
not a deal breaker or anything, but the shape, the size, is many times
different than one might have anticipated.”
When asked if the lined bra has made the breasts of New York City lose
their uniqueness, department store saleswomen chorused no. They countered
that each design is cut differently, offering a different breast shape.
Yet The Observer’s investigation suggests that the only “difference”
amounted to the perfect mounds being pushed higher, lower, inward or outward.
What’s curious is the lack of protest by women who don’t want
their breasts to look like everyone else’s. The average bra buyer
is seemingly oblivious or indifferent to breast homogenization. “I
don’t know, I’ve never really thought about it, “ said
one young woman at the Gap, shrugging her shoulders. “I don’t
think too many women go around analyzing breasts.”
Some women have even made the conscious choice to wear the lined bra,
such as a 38-year-old petite, buxom portfolio strategist who declined
to give her name as she works (oh the irony!) in a major asset management
company. She unapologetically called her breasts “corporate boobs,”
and likened her bras to shields. “I don’t want to walk by
the guys in sales and feel vulnerable,” she said with a reluctant
laugh. “I think it’s about control. You can’t control
your nipples. I hated days when I’d catch a reflection of myself
and see my nipples. I felt betrayed.”
Even Calvin Klein, a company known since its inception for sexy, edgy
designs and advertising, has its version of the lined bra. In a sleek,
lustrous showroom at Calvin Klein Underwear in the garment district, VP
of design Mireille Gindrey noted that the company’s best-selling
bra in the U.S. has indeed been the smooth, padded cup. “I do think
it’s cultural,” said Ms. Gindrey, originally from France,
sitting next to Emily Bohonos, director of marketing, who nodded in agreement.
“It has to do with modesty and comfort. But you can achieve an ultra-sexy
bra, even if it’s simple and smooth.”
Both of the elegantly dressed women animatedly described intriguing global
marketing bra trends but grew uncomfortably silent when asked why women
in New York, a city that carries a reputation for individuality, seem
to be content with generic breasts.
“Wrong attention,” Ms. Gindrey finally said quietly, adding
that here, attention can be a form of aggression. “While in France,
if a man gives a look, I might think, ‘Oh, I must look good today!’”
she laughed.
Ms. Bohonos added that many of today’s residents of New York are
interested in luxury living and “trading up,” contributing
to the general feeling of conformity, including the breast. Think of it
as the W hotelization of the decolletage.
Protesting the Padding
But thankfully, New York City still has corners—and cleavage—that
gentrification has yet to reach.
In her basement studio-showroom on West 15th Street, surrounded by hanging
lace bras and garter belts in fluorescent colors, amid the sounds of sewing
machines churning away, rebel lingerie designer Deborah Marquit reflected
on her philosophy of simply decorating a woman’s figure and her
outright rejection of designing a padded bra.
“I love making lacy, sexy bras for a 32A chest,” Ms. Marquit
said. “I see the woman say, ‘I love it. I never thought I
could wear a bra like this!’ There is something about flaws—having
a little cellulite, wrinkles, being a little fat, it’s way more
sexy. Do I think all breasts are beautiful? Honestly, no. But you can
beautify what you have.”
Ms. Marquit, 53, a native New Yorker, has been designing lingerie for
23 years, and her collections have sold at Barneys, among other high-end
stores. She said that the proliferation of padded bras has to do with
cheap manufacturing costs—they are almost all made in China—but
suggested also that it’s a reflection of the current state of our
culture.“My feeling is that these days, rather than someone like
Janis Joplin being revered, idolized, it’s more about the shoe or
the bag of the moment,” she said. “It’s about labels,
names, branding. Everyone has their hair straightened, the perfect jeans,
the right cellphone and accessories. It’s almost like New York is
turning into L.A.; there is a lack of acceptance of natural self.”
Though New York women do not appear to be embracing surgical implants
with the same zeal as their sisters in the West … yet?
“I see a lot of women’s bodies; there was this one beautiful
woman here recently, and she wanted implants,” said Ms. Marquit,
dressed in all black, with unruly red hair. “I told her not to come
back if she got them.”
Holly Copeland, a former Rockette who’s now a stylist, has asked
her models to take their padded bras off when styling fashion shoots.
“But when I’ve worked with celebrities, I always have to have
one on hand,” she said. “It’s almost taboo to have any
of that showing.” Moreover, she remarked, “everyone wants
to have bigger boobs. Victoria’s Secret makes it easy to get big
boobs without surgery.”
But on the front lines of bra sales at La Petite Coquette, the downtown
lingerie shop with a loyal following, a recent, hopeful shift has been
felt by the sales staff. “Women are tired of looking like everyone
else,” said proprietor Rebecca Apsan in a husky voice. She was surrounded
by lacy bras, panties, silken robes, and boudoir-like props.“There
is a decline now,” in the padded bra, Ms. Apsan added, “because
women want to be more natural. Women are doing something underneath that
makes them feel feminine.”
“We’re still selling them,” conceded store manager Martina
Solej, “but I find lately, women want to be sexier. It’s changing
little by little.” Ms. Solej recounted a client she had earlier
that day, barely able to contain her joy. A businesswoman had renounced
her padded bra, literally throwing it out in the garbage. The client made
huge waves in the store when, according to Ms. Solej and many of the saleswomen,
she declared, “‘Screw it! Give me a lacy bra. I’m going
to let them see that, yeah, I might be the only woman here, and I’m
professional—and I’m wearing a lace bra!’”
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